


you can throw me to the flames

by imagines



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Clothed Sex, Epilogue What Epilogue, Explicit Consent, Fix-it fic, M/M, emotional validation, he is looking at Keith, otherwise canon compliant, post-s8, shiro loves you baby, smut with feelings, takes place right after e13
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-16
Updated: 2018-12-16
Packaged: 2019-09-20 01:12:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,910
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17012715
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/imagines/pseuds/imagines
Summary: Shiro’s good at looking forward. So good at it, he’d stopped looking at Keith, and the next time he’d turned his gaze that direction, Keith was no longer there. Oh, he was physically present, standing on the bridge of the Atlas, or having lunch in the canteen, or running drills with the paladins. But something between them had dissolved—something Shiro hadn’t known could ever vanish. Complacency kills in more ways than one.When they arrive at Keith’s room, Keith puts his hand on the sensor beside the door. It opens, and Keith takes one step inside—The lions are gone now, and with them, Shiro’s last shared connection with Keith. The two of them lead separate lives, and it’s not anywhere near the future Shiro had let himself hope for in his weakest moments.He can’t let it go on like this any longer. This war has already taken everything from him, including his own life. Maybe Keith is gone for good, but in that case, Shiro’s got nothing left to lose by trying.





	you can throw me to the flames

**Author's Note:**

> SO THAT SURE WAS A SEASON, HUH? anyway here's what really happened after the lions left. :)
> 
> title is from [Bring Me the Horizon - Follow Me](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JgSaM2xZieU), which i had on repeat for literally the whole time i was writing this today. it's good. very intense. very sheith.

****It’s been several minutes, and Lance is still staring at the place in the sky where the lions vanished. “They’re really gone, huh?”

“Do you think they’ll ever come back?” Pidge asks. No one answers, but Hunk puts an arm around her, and she leans into his side.

After awhile, Shiro clears his throat. “I’m gonna head back inside. Getting a bit cold like this, heh.” He gestures at his bare shoulders and arm. In a hurry to get outside, he hadn’t grabbed anything with longer sleeves.

“I’ll come in too,” Keith says. “Hey, uh, Lance, you gonna be all right out here?”

Pidge slips her hand into Lance’s and squeezes hard. “We’ll stay with him. Until he’s ready.”

“Yeah,” Hunk agrees. “So don’t worry about us. Just get some rest, okay?”

They all have ways of holding on.

* * *

Back inside, they walk in silence to the sleeping quarters of Altea’s castle.

Shiro used to hold onto Keith, even as the universe tried its damnedest to tear them apart. Each loss carved them open; each reunion healed the wounds. But every cut left a mark, and the damage grew like scar tissue, constricting their movement and choking off their friendship. Later, later, Shiro had believed—later they could repair the canyon cracking open between them. And so the war devoured years of their lives, eating away at their former intimacy and leaving them almost strangers.

Shiro’s good at looking forward. So good at it, he’d stopped looking at Keith, and the next time he’d turned his gaze that direction, Keith was no longer there. Oh, he was physically present, standing on the bridge of the Atlas, or having lunch in the canteen, or running drills with the paladins. But something between them had dissolved—something Shiro hadn’t known could ever vanish. Complacency kills in more ways than one.

When they arrive at Keith’s room, Keith puts his hand on the sensor beside the door. It opens, and Keith takes one step inside—

The lions are gone now, and with them, Shiro’s last shared connection with Keith. The two of them lead separate lives, and it’s not anywhere near the future Shiro had let himself hope for in his weakest moments.

He can’t let it go on like this any longer. This war has already taken everything from him, including his own life. Maybe Keith is gone for good, but in that case, Shiro’s got nothing left to lose by trying.

“Keith,” Shiro says, and Keith freezes. Shiro can’t see the expression on his face, but at least he isn’t trying to leave. He also isn’t turning toward Shiro, but Shiro can’t really be surprised by that.

“What is it, sir?”

Keith used to call him by that title in playfulness. Hearing it spoken so seriously is hard to swallow. “I don’t know how to start,” Shiro tells him, because for all his talent at inspiring others, he’s never been good at opening up about his own feelings. He doesn’t have a speech for this situation.

 _That_ makes Keith face him, leaning against the wall with his arms folded. The door slides shut like a cruel metaphor. “What are you talking about?”

“You and me,” Shiro tries. “This. Us.” He hangs his head, cringing inwardly. “I’m really bad at this. But I wanted to talk to you.”

Keith pinches the bridge of his nose. “It’s late, our lions have just flown off to who knows where, and you wanna talk.” He doesn’t sound angry, just…confused, perhaps, and exhausted too.

“Yes,” Shiro says. “I—I’ve been meaning to. For awhile.”

“So talk.”

“Do you want to talk in your room?”

Keith shrugs. “I think your room might be better.”

What Keith probably means is, Shiro’s room is easier to leave if he finds himself done with listening. At this point, Shiro’s willing to do whatever makes Keith more comfortable. “Sure, that’s fine with me.”

* * *

Shiro sits down on his bed, elbows on his thighs and hands hanging between his knees. He’s not cut out for this, and it’s not any less awkward with a closed door between them and the world.

Keith remains standing in the center of the room. His arms are crossed again. Shiro must be taking too long to speak, because Keith says, “Shiro, I can’t start this conversation for you. I don’t know what it’s about.”

“Right,” Shiro says. “Um. I guess, to begin with, I miss you.”

Keith’s eyebrows rise a fraction. “You sure you really wanna do this in the middle of the night?”

“I’m not sure about much anymore. Not where it concerns you.”

“That doesn’t answer my question.”

“Yes, I’m sure,” Shiro says. “I’ve waited too long already.”

“Got that right,” Keith says under his breath.

Well, Shiro deserves that, he’s pretty sure. “I just feel so far away from you.”

“Whose fault is that?” Keith’s calm demeanor is starting to break, a spark of anger flaring up. “I never thought you of all people would—would—” He stops, as if there are no words for what Shiro’s done to him. Maybe there aren’t.

“I was trying to give you space,” Shiro starts to explain, but Keith jumps in again.

“After everything that happened between us, why the hell would you think I wanted _space_?” Keith’s hands fall away from his chest, ending up in clenched fists at his sides. “Why would I ever want to be away from you, when I almost lost you forever?”

“But, Keith—you kept leaving. You can’t blame me for—”

“I do blame you.” Keith’s voice is colder and quieter than Shiro’s ever heard it. “You never asked me what I needed.”

“Keith, I’m so sorry—”

Keith holds up a hand. He’s breathing hard and trembling, but his voice is steady. “But I also blame myself. You need to know that. I’m not angry just at you—I’m furious with myself. Because I didn’t ask you how you felt, either. I let myself lose trust in you, trust you’ve never before broken, and I didn’t talk to you about how bad it was getting for me. And then we stopped trying. We _both_ stopped trying, Shiro. You didn’t cause all this by yourself.”

“I don’t know how to fix it,” Shiro says. “Should I try? Is there still hope?”

“I said I’d never give up on you. I meant that. I haven’t given up, not completely. So—if you meant it too—”

Shiro’s on his feet before he’s aware of moving. “I meant it,” he gasps. “Keith, I could never give up on you, I never will, _never_ —”

“Come here.”

It is a command, and it’s Shiro’s turn to obey. He crosses the room to stand before Keith, prepared to accept whatever it is Keith may offer him now, whether judgement or absolution. He’s only an arm’s length away, close enough to touch, but—Shiro doesn’t know yet if Keith wants to be touched.

“We fucked up,” Keith says softly. “But I’ve learned a lot of things from you since I met you. Like patience, and focus—” There’s a tiny smile teasing at the corner of his mouth. “And that sometimes you just have to dive off a cliff and trust that the ground will be there to hold you up.” He reaches up to grab the collar of Shiro’s tank top. “You know now that I didn’t want distance. So ask me, Shiro. Ask me what I wanted back then.”

“What was it that you wanted?”

“Only you,” Keith says.

Shiro is no longer chilled from the night air. On the contrary, he could strip and he’d still burn all over. “And now?” He’s hardly able to draw breath to speak.

Keith yanks on his fistful of Shiro’s shirt, forcing Shiro to lean down, closer now to Keith than he’s been in years. Or maybe ever. Has Keith’s mouth been so near his own before? Keith’s breath is hot on Shiro’s lips when he answers. “Only you.”

This should be harder, and maybe with anyone else it would be. But Keith puts up no resistance, opening immediately to Shiro’s tongue, the soft wet heat of his mouth consuming Shiro like a fireball. In minutes Shiro’s body starts to betray him, and he thinks to excuse himself, but Keith wraps strong arms around Shiro’s waist and pulls him close. The sudden contact makes him gasp, and he opens his mouth to apologize—

Keith is laughing, and still kissing him. “Never knew you felt like _that_ ,” he teases. He nips at Shiro’s mouth. “Hey, I can hear you panicking. It’s just me, Shiro. You can talk to me.” His grip on Shiro tightens, and through the haze of desire, Shiro notices—

Ah. It’s not just him reacting. It’s Keith, too. But there are rules for this, aren’t there? Standard protocols? “We shouldn’t,” Shiro says. “We should—”

“What, wait longer? Talk more? Maybe. Or maybe we’ve spent long enough restraining ourselves.” Keith draws back to look Shiro in the eye. “If you need to back off for now, it’s okay. I’m not going to leave if you do. I’m not going to leave you ever again. But if it’s me you’re worrying about—Shiro, please trust me when I say I want this. I want _you_.”

“I want you too, I just—” Shiro can’t keep the desperation out of his voice. He’s almost certain they’re supposed to wait some unspecified length of time, have an unknown number of conversations, before they travel any further on this path. “I want to do this right.”

“Let’s take a breather,” Keith says. “Can we sit down?”

“Of course. Wherever you feel comfortable.”

Having Keith beside him on the bed does absolutely nothing to quell the sensation that all of Shiro’s cells are on fire. He feels like a teenager, shy with a boy in his bedroom for the first time—except it’s not the first time, and it’s not just any boy.

“You’re freaking out a little, right?” Keith asks, always last in place in every beat-around-the-bush competition.

“I’ve made enough missteps for one lifetime. Let alone the two _I_ apparently get.” Shiro tacks on the joke just to watch Keith roll his eyes, before returning to solemnity. “I can’t mess this up too.”

“You don’t have to live by someone else’s invisible rulebook, especially not with me. What does ‘doing this right’ mean to you?”

“You know—just—respecting you, and.” Shiro’s face must be blazing red even in the dim light in his room. “Taking it as slowly as you need to. Communicating about what we want.”

“So what part of that means you can’t kiss me yet, or—” Keith casts his eyes sideways, but he looks more devilish than embarrassed. “Other things?”

“I—don’t really have an answer for that.”

“Like I said, I’ll be happy to wait if you want. But if you want more, right now, then so do I.”

“What exactly do you want from me?”

“I want to touch you,” Keith whispers. “I want a lot of things, but mostly that. I missed hugging you. I like kissing you. I want to kiss you everywhere.” He turns to Shiro, holding his gaze, until whatever he sees there makes him continue. “I want to hold you in my arms and make you come. I want you to pin me down and make me take whatever you want to give me. How am I doing at communicating so far?”

“Full marks,” Shiro breathes. “You’re very talented. At everything.”

Keith grins. “Yeah. I am.” He flops onto his back, stretching his arms over his head; Shiro tries and fails not to look at the strip of bare skin where his shirt rides up. “Good talk, Shiro. I’m pretty tired, though, so maybe I should head to bed soon.”

Shiro’s not an idiot. There’s an enormous flashing neon sign of a hint in there. “Would you like to stay here?”

“I would love to, actually.” Keith is already melting against the comforter spread out on the bed. “We can just sleep, I mean. I’m not trying to push you into anything. I miss being this close to you, that’s all.”

“We’ve never actually cuddled in a bed before,” Shiro points out.

“Then we gotta make up for lost time.” Keith flips the edge of the blanket back and burrows under it, patting the sheets beside him. “Get in here.”

* * *

By the clock on Shiro’s nightstand—its green numbers glowing accusingly—they make it all of twelve minutes before they’re making out again. Shiro’s got his left hand buried in Keith’s hair and his right spread wide across Keith’s belly. So it’s easy to feel the way Keith’s hips keep twitching upward, as if he’s barely holding himself back from moving.

Shiro wants to do this right, and what that means to him is—he doesn’t want Keith to hold back anymore. Keith is wild, impulsive, and brutally honest. He wouldn’t know how to fake his feelings, and he wouldn’t want to try. When he says he wants more, wants anything and everything, Shiro knows he’s telling the truth. “Keith,” Shiro whispers. “Come here.”

“Huh?— _Oh_ ,” Keith says, as Shiro pulls him until he’s lying on top of Shiro. “Okay. Hi.”

“Hi.” Shiro smiles up at him, sliding a careful hand down Keith’s spine. He pauses at the small of Keith’s back, then presses down hard, watching Keith’s mouth open around a soft cry.

Keith’s head tips forward, and he buries his face in Shiro’s shoulder. “You—you do know what you’re doing—right? You know this is— _ahh—_ ”

“I know,” Shiro murmurs. “It’s okay.” He moves his hand lower, cupping Keith’s ass through his sweatpants, and pulls Keith hard against him again. This time he rocks his hips up, increasing the pressure. Keith starts making a lot more noise. “You want this?” Shiro asks, low in Keith’s ear.

“Fuck, _fuck_ , Shiro, _please_ —”

“I’ve got you, Keith. You can have me. You can have what you need.”

“Tell me you’re sure.”

“I’m sure. I want to see you come for me, baby.”

Keith’s eyes widen, and for a split second, Shiro’s about to take back the pet name—it had just slipped out, he hadn’t meant to—but Keith is already answering: “Say it again. Call me that again.”

“Baby,” Shiro whispers, trying it out with more intention. Keith collapses against him, sinking his teeth into the strap of Shiro’s shirt, but it’s not enough to stifle his moans. Shiro holds him down, helping him roll his hips, and the friction is good, it’s _so_ good, and it’s _Keith_ , and without much warning Shiro finds himself coming, crying out against Keith’s throat. Keith just keeps moving, and it’s very quickly too much sensation, but like hell Shiro’s gonna stop him. “Like that—oh, Keith, just like that, let me see you, I need to see you—”

“Look at me,” Keith growls, flinging his head up. He’s baring his teeth, and strands of his hair stick to his face. He’s a storm about to break; he’s never been more beautiful.

“I am looking at you, I’ll never stop—”

Keith bites down hard on Shiro’s lower lip, shaking against him, until finally he lies still in Shiro’s arms, sweaty and breathless and perfect. “That,” he says, “was not what I was expecting when you said you wanted to talk.”

“Can’t say I was expecting it either.” Shiro strokes Keith’s hair, gently working out the tangles from their…exertion. “But I’m okay with how this went.”

“Me too. A lot.”

Shiro’s on the verge of falling asleep, but there’s something else to address. Keith’s habit of taking off into space is—understandable, especially by Shiro. But they should probably still talk about what it means for them. “So… what _do_ you wanna do now that the war is over?” Shiro asks.

Keith looks out the window, where the stars shine bright like promises. “Is it weird if all I want is to go back out there?—But not alone,” he adds quickly. “If I go, I want you with me. And if you want to stay here, then I’m staying too.”

“What about a little of both? Traveling the universe could include traveling Earth, too.”

“I think I’d like that,” Keith muses. “I just don’t want to stand still.”

“So we’ll go everywhere. We’ll see the stars and the Grand Canyon. Orbit Saturn and go deep-sea diving. Maybe break some records while we’re at it.”

“You and your _records_.”

Shiro rolls his eyes. “Like you don’t delight in breaking all of mine?”

“Oh, you know it. You set ‘em up, I’ll take ‘em down.” Keith yawns, nosing at Shiro’s shoulder. “But right now I think I’d like to break some kind of sleeping record.”

“I accept your challenge,” Shiro says. “See you in the morning.”

“Sure thing. We can get breakfast. Maybe do more of that talking you like so much.”

“You seem to like it fine when I talk to you.”

Keith hides his smile against Shiro’s skin. “Yeah, I do. I really, really do. Don’t ever stop.”

“I never will.”

Keith’s fingers sneak in between Shiro’s, and Shiro holds on tight.

* * *

_So you can drag me through hell_  
_If it meant I could hold your hand_  
_I will follow you 'cause I'm under your spell_  
_And **you can throw me to the flames**_  
_I will follow you, I will follow you_

**Author's Note:**

> *barely edits this and hurls it into the fandom because god i need fix-it smut*
> 
> that was fucking cathartic to write, let me tell you! you can pry this ship from my cold dead hands. 😌
> 
> tumblr is dead to me so [twitter is where i live now](https://twitter.com/belovedsheith/)! :) come say hi, scream w/ me about sheith, and/or salt with me about the season i'm going to forget as hard as i can. love you, sheith fandom, and i hope you stick around.


End file.
